Tea at Trianon: The Tragedy of Lady Jane Grey

John Wilson Croker on Marie-Antoinette

"We have followed the history of Marie Antoinette with the greatest diligence and scrupulosity. We have lived in those times. We have talked with some of her friends and some of her enemies; we have read, certainly not all, but hundreds of the libels written against her; and we have, in short, examined her life with– if we may be allowed to say so of ourselves– something of the accuracy of contemporaries, the diligence of inquirers, and the impartiality of historians, all combined; and we feel it our duty to declare, in as a solemn a manner as literature admits of, our well-matured opinion that every reproach against the morals of the queen was a gross calumny– that she was, as we have said, one of the purest of human beings."

~from History of the Guillotine by John Wilson Croker, 1844

Edmund Burke on Marie-Antoinette

"It is now sixteen or seventeen years since I saw the queen of France, then dauphiness, at Versailles; and surely there never lighted on this orb, which she hardly seemed to touch, a more delightful vision. I saw her just above the horizon, decorating and cheering the elevated sphere she had just begun to move in, glittering like a morning star full of life and splendor and joy. Oh, what a revolution....Little did I dream that I should have lived to see such disasters fall upon her, in a nation of gallant men, in a nation of men of honor and of cavaliers! I thought ten thousand swords must have leaped from their scabbards, to avenge even a look which threatened her with insult. But the age of chivalry is gone; that of sophisters, economists, and calculators has succeeded...."

~Edmund Burke, October 1790

Monday, September 16, 2019

The Tragedy of Lady Jane Grey

Both of Lady Jane's parents were descended from Elizabeth Woodville. From Nancy Bilyeau:

The Greys’ fate intertwined with that of England’s royal family at several fateful junctures. The first grey owner was Edward Grey, whose son John married Elizabeth Woodville. After John’s death in battle in the war of the roses, his beautiful widow married the king her husband had opposed, Edward IV. Their children included Elizabeth of York, who would become the mother of Henry VIII.

The Grey family, though not royal, was close to power, being related to the Yorks and Tudors. One of Elizabeth’s sons by her first marriage was Sir Thomas Grey, the 1st Marquess of Dorset. “Sometime after 1490 Sir Thomas prepared the land to build an impressive house in the former medieval deer park,” according to Britain Express. “He intended his new house to replace the old Grey house at Groby. Unfortunately, he died in 1501 before the project could begin and it was left to his son Thomas Grey, the 2nd Marquess, to build Bradgate House. The house was finished sometime around 1520.”

It was built in red brick, now a common building material but in the early Tudor period red brick was an expensive material and rarely used. “The fact that Bradgate House was built in brick is a clear sign that Grey was trying to make a statement of his wealth and prestige,” said Britain Express. “It is also one of the earliest unfortified manor houses in England, a testament to the relatively peaceful interlude following the end of the Wars of the Roses.” (Read more.)